Starbucks Drama

Starbucks Drama: The Ultimate Starbucks Fashion Model Drink Order

2010-03-09T10:00:00.002-05:00

Today's post is a riddle:

QUESTION: What is the ultimate fashion model drink order at Starbucks?

ANSWER: Please. Did you think it would be that easy? You gonna have to sit through some prose first.

I WITNESSED THIS ATROCITY WITH MY OWN TWO EYES. AND EARS. IF THERE WAS HALF A BRAIN BETWEEN THE FIVE OF THEM IT WAS A HALF A BRAIN TOO MUCH.

It is Spring Break in most of the land and the waifs and wild things descend upon the crystal beaches, warm sands and billowing palm trees of Florida. At least, they would be if the temperatures weren't forty degrees and old people huddle in sweaters everywhere. But still, the bright young things flock to the relative warmth of the summerlands from the frozen frigid wastes of the north.

Five fashionable females prance into the Starbucks.

Five fashionable females stare at the pastry case with sad, dead eyes. They have been whittled down to icepicks and carbs are a Stone Age memory. They want them though - even if they can't have them.

Five fashionable females queue for the bathroom and stare with disdain at the old people drinking coffee and occupying the comfortable leather sofa. That should be *their* throne.

Five fashionable females stand, chatter and can't decide whether or not to order anything.

ONE of the five fashionable females finally makes her intrepid approach to the register. Of the quintet, she's one that looks closest to having a figure instead of a few extra folds of skin in places. Her one major asset is a curvaceous and downright bootylicious rear end, which gives every impression that she's not wearing much more than a thong under her flimsy canary yellow skirt. What curves she has left are in *exactly* the right places.

She clip-clops toward the register.

And orders in a tremulous voice.

"Can I get a ......"

Wait for it .....

Wait for it .....

Wait for it .....

Half a glass of water. No ice.

Starbucks Drama: Date Night at Starbucks

2010-03-08T09:13:00.001-05:00

For the purposes of this post, we'll pretend that the cafe at Barnes & Noble (which serves Starbucks) is, in fact, an outpost of Starbucks. Even if it isn't.

I watch people constantly. One of these days, as my friends say, that's going to get me smacked upside the head. But you see so much more interesting things that way.

Do you ever "see" things - people, places, couples, groupings - that make no sense unless you assume some unsavory things? Occam's razor goes right out the window in times like this. And they always seem to occur at coffee shops - which are a breeding ground for the weird and the wonderful.

I'm reading - because I've been working on a trashtastic book that I'm too cheap to buy for months now and nursing an iced mocha. My friends are doing whatever - one has an obsession with cookbooks and will spend hours flipping through the pages of gourmet food bibles. Then *THEY* sit down.

OK. Tell the truth. What do *you* think of when you see this combo: An older man (late 60s) wearing jeans, a pullover and loafers. AND. A skinny white boy, with floppy hair, wearing slacks, jacket and tie. He had an air of terrible sophistication about him and was all in blue - baby blue shirt, navy blue pants and jacket and and piercing blue eyes. I would say late teens, early twenties. There was at least a 40-year age difference between them, at a minimum.

And there was some decidedly odd body language going on between the two of them.

They drifted around the magazine stacks and came to sit at a table. The older man selected "Powder," which is for snowboarders. Our effete young sophisticate selected a weighty tome dedicated to woodworking.

They flipped through them with a display of feigned interest that would have rivaled that of any monarch at any court function in history. Flick went the page, flick went the eye across the table. Wash, rinse, repeat.

There is almost no spoken communication at the table - just looks exchanged between the two. The older gentleman gets up to get a coffee and comes back with a frappuccino for the young kid. He toys with it.

They finally put the magazines aside and sit there for a while. The kid is sitting crosswise in the chair, with one knee on top of the other. He draws patterns on the tabletop with his finger as he gazes idly at the room. The older man sighs and finally reaches his hands out across the table.

They stare at each other. I never see them touch. I never hear them say anything.

And suddenly, they're gone.

Friends, lovers, NAMBLA, family members - I will never know.

Spilling Coffee at Starbucks

2010-03-02T11:09:00.000-05:00

I absolutely adore mornings at Starbucks. It is the intersection of Drama Street and Caffeine Deprivation Avenue. All the hopped up coffee junkies aching for a fix flock to the welcome arms of the green apron espresso pushers before they're able to see straight in a bid to get their neurons firing.
I do my best to stay out of their way. Well out of their way.

This particular happened on a Monday - always a lovely day - because people have been cooped up at home with their family, birds, cats, dogs, children and husbands for two days and are either desperate to get back to the office or dreading facing the music of the cubicle-go-round. Either way, they NEED SOME COFFEE!

I had gotten my iced venti mocha and wedged myself into an out-of-the-way corner trying to reply to an URGENT! email on my phone (for the love of little apples people, it is 8:05 a.m., can it wait until I get coffee?). Then, this happened.

I'm jammed into the corner, sighing and trying to get enough coffee into me to think coherently and reply to a crisis not of my own making, when I hear the slap of expensive sandals coming toward me on a tile floor.

I look up and a well-appointed woman in a black business suit with her hair pulled back in a blonde pageboy is juggling a briefcase, a cell phone and a venti coffee. And juggling *IS* the appropriate term for this.

Madame Moneymaker is taking the door at a dead run, except that she wedged the phone into her ear and has neglected to get the lid back onto the coffee after dousing it with cream, sugar and milk.

Instead of taking the time to go back to the condiment bar and FIX THE PROBLEM, she keeps walking, attempting to fix the problem in mid-run. She's barking into the phone and jiggling the lid of the coffee.

Splash. And a wave of coffee slops out and onto the floor. Miraculously, none of it hits her, the suit or the briefcase. She shrugs, slows a step and keeps adjusting.

She's halfway between the condiment bar and the door now, and still working. More furious orders into the phone and the briefcase has fallen into the crook of her arm, hampering efforts to adjust the coffee. No matter, she hikes it back up - and sends another splash of coffee onto the floor. This one gets her hand, which she slings into the air in disgust before wiping it down with a napkin and mouthing some unmentionables into the phone.

The lid still isn't on the coffee. She finally takes the lid ALL THE WAY OFF and kicks the door open and goes out to her car, phone crooked between shoulder and ear, briefcase on the elbow, coffee in one hand and lid in another.

Two coffee spots are on the floor. I'm agape. I look up, and a barista has witnessed the entire thing. She rolls her eyes and goes for the mop. I go for my camera.

I had to capture the moment for posterity. I only wish I had had the daring to switch on the video and capture the full flight of this magnificent species in full walk, talk and coffee-juggle.

What I learned from my mentor

2010-03-01T22:31:00.001-05:00

For starters, this is not a Starbucks Drama post. If you only attend for the musings of the coffee-addicted habituees of the green-apron shop, then leave now.

This is a blogger's roundtable post, courtesy of my former co-worker Holly Hoffman. She's the force behind worklovelife.com and co-owner of Neovia Solutions. I hope she does me the honor of counting me among her friends.

You can read more about the format for this blog happening here ("It's not a rave, it's a happening!"). The subject is mentors.

I have had many mentors in my life. I count myself fortunate enough to have been touched by any number of extraordinary people - but one remains with me more than 25 years later.

I grew up in one of the poorest Delta parishes of Louisiana. Almost 30% of the population of Richland Parish is below the poverty line; there are only 20,000 people in the entire parish. The largest town, Rayville, has a population of 4,000.

I did not grow up in "town." Until 1997, the year I graduated from college, people driving to my parents house - which they'd moved into when I was four - included "Turn off the paved road." My two-hour school bus ride took me to Holly Ridge Elementary, home to 400 K-4 and later K-8 students. The school no longer exists.

I could not read in kindergarten; several other students could - and our teacher made those of us who could not read feel ashamed. I had difficulty learning to read in first grade because the prevailing educational theory at the time taught phonics.

I was - and am - about 30% deaf, so "hukd on fonyks" didn't really "wuryk 4 me." Once I *got* reading though, how letters made up words, how words went together and how words made up sentences, I got it all at once. I went from "Pug" to third-grade level books in a matter of weeks; I even read textbooks for practice.

I still process information this way. I think of it as the "Big Gulp" theory - I have to completely wrap my head around something - and then once I have it, I have it completely, but until then, nothing.

Back to mentoring.

I won't reveal her name - we'll use Mary Smith - but she was my Gifted & Talented (as it was called in Louisiana) teacher from 2nd through 8th grade. Under her tutelage, I didn't just practice critical thinking, I learned what critical thinking was, how and when to apply it and how to actually use it.

Think of an oak tree. I was the acorn that had to first discover what heat, light, water and the soil were - and then how to convert those elements into the building blocks of life. I could never have done it if someone hadn't shown me that I had to grow up, toward the light.

Gifted & Talented was something *SPECIAL* at our school. Through the first half of the second grade, only one person in the entire school got "Gifted" classes. The Gifted teacher commuted in special for that one student and drove a diesel Mercedes that none of the regular teachers at my in-the-sticks school could afford. The girl that had that class was "special," because she was the only one who got Mrs. Smith's attention for an hour a day while the rest of us did social studies.

At the end of the first grade, all students took achievement tests. In somewhat of a surprise, I ran the table and finished far, far ahead of the rest of my class - including the one girl who was in the Gifted program. Of course, this was the first grade.

At the start of the second grade, the school district asked my parents (and the parents of two other students) if we wanted to be tested for the Gifted program. I remember going into a tiny room at the School Board building in town and running through what seemed like hours and hours of tests that made no sense to a second-grader. Of course, they were pretty average - shape and pattern recognition, sequencing and basic logic test. I passed, whatever passing would have been. The two other students "failed" to advance. Maybe this was some sort of proto-Gattaca or something.

It took more months for the paperwork to get processed, during which the girl who was already in the Gifted program was absolutely wretched to me, because she was afraid that she'd lose her "exclusive" place. She lost it.

It has taken me 747 words to find the right words to say that "The Gifted program was the first time in public education that I felt challenged, stretched, pushed and made to think." This continued for the next seven years. Every time I felt complacent, I was pushed farther.

Mary Smith inherited a lump of formless clay. She left a Rodin. How did she do it?

814 words later, we get to the point.

Every single thing we did in class was fun. Every single thing we did in class was educational. Every single thing we did in class we did taught me something.

In the fourth grade, I spent a week sewing and beading a sweater.

In the fifth grade, I wanted to study art, so the entire year was spent finding images in magazines that I could duplicate. I ripped paper to duplicate a mod Marlboro ad. I spent a month trying to recreate a Christmas ad out of wrapping paper and shopping bags.

My December project was a full-size gingerbread house. This was an experiment of grand proportions. I learned geometry (cutting sizes and shapes), budgeting, chemistry (mixing icing) and art, art and more art.

In the third grade, I started a series of what was called T.O.P.S. - Techniques Of Problem Solving. These were a series of cards in a Trivial Pursuit-size box, each with a critical thinking problem or logic puzzle on them. The box had to be done by the end of the year. I remember one of my lesser successes - "Candy Cane Cola," which was the solution to "Design a new soda, including can, slogan and marketing campaign." For some reason, I didn't think that soda had enough sugar.

Geography was my favorite. This was my first introduction to Carmen Sandiego. And to the meticulous approach to life that would serve the rest of my my days.

Mrs. Smith was a dedicated fan of note-taking, remembering details and paying attention. In many, if not most of the lessons in my curriculum, these were always at the heart. I played the computer version of "Carmen Sandiego" religiously, only to one day complain that I'd missed a villain because I'd forgotten a clue. "Why didn't you write it down?" I never missed a villain again - and was soon making connections within the game faster, because I recognized what villains were trying to do.

I was always supposed to be the best at whatever I did. Every game we played, every project I started, every problem I solved - finishing wasn't the goal. I was supposed to finish it *well.* I marvel at how different this philosophy is from today's public education.

Mah jong was another favorite. We played the entire week before Christmas in my eighth grade year, both in the name of culture and to teach me to think beyond the obvious patterns of "remove the first tile you can."

At some point, I learned the alleged longest word in the English language - "Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis." (Thank you, I typed it out correctly from memory! - just like I can still recite the Greek alphabet from memory!) My test on that word included identifying the largest number of individual words I could make out of it within 30 minutes and trying to come up the single longest *other* word from the component letters.

And so we went. I made bulletin boards; tested myself on speed-reading (398 wpm); spent two weeks on learning Esperanto; read "Call of the Wild;" filled out vocabulary papers on what a "flume ditch" was; drew ghosts, unicorns and bats; spent two weeks exploring M.C. Escher; solved logic puzzles; found out what quahogs were before "Family Guy" made them cool; discovered I was nearly 80% right-brained; painted; sewed; read the entire Chronicles of Narnia and the entire Newberry shelf at the Richland Parish Public Library; milk-fed a pumpkin; read Orwell's "Animal Farm" (yes, in the sixth grade); solved Brain Teasers; created homemade Christmas cards; wrote about everything I found out and learned that I was *supposed* to be smart, well-read and intelligent. Along the way, I discovered that not everyone saw the world with the same pair of eyes that I did.

I left my K-8 school in 1989. I did not enter Gifted classes in high school. It was an elective that required giving up some things in your schedule; in addition, I had met the person who taught Gifted at the high school level and we *did not* get along. I opted for history instead. Which served me better in college anyway.

I saw my Gifted teacher one more time, at my high school graduation. I thanked her for everything she had done, but four years later, she had other students and other proteges to worry about.

To this day, I don't know if she ever knew how much she influenced me. She had many other students in her career - and she drove to three other schools in her circuit - but for me, she was the path to enlightenment. Thank you, Mary Smith.

Homeless Crazy Fat Man at Starbucks

2010-03-01T12:21:00.001-05:00

This is the crazy fat man that inspired these two tweets. Tweet One | Tweet Two

Here now, is the ...... the rest of the story.

This is the Starbucks at US 41 and Immokalee Road. I rolled out with a friend of mine for a quick post-lunch, pre-afternoon meeting caffeine break when we saw this craziness go down.

We were sitting in my car - a recalled Toyota as I'm so fond of putting it now - and preparing to get out when this .... man walked right in front of us.

He looked like a homeless person and there was *definitely* something strange going on. He had what looked like a huge sack of something stuffed up under his shirt. It was either that or the biggest beer belly this side of Boss Hogg. (Sorrell Booke, you are sorely missed.)

Despite my love for Starbucks Drama - we have a *firm* policy of not entering a place when it looks like there might be a homeless person threatening to blow the place up. No caffeine is worth this.

Dumpy makes a trip up and down the patio and the goes inside. He pops back out immediately and makes another trip back and forth down the length of the patio. We're gasping for breath from laughing and screaming and going "WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?" Of course, we've both already tweeted the news.

We're waiting for him to make another pass so we can grab a photo or video - but not be too obvious. We don't want to provoke a "situation."

He goes back inside. And right back out. It must not smell right.

We're trapped in the car. We *need* a coffee, but we're not quite sure what to do about him. He's looking more unstable by the second and we can't figure out what the heck he has under that shirt. Mike Tyson? A tiger? World Peace? A health care plan? Who knows?

He makes another pass and I get off a few photos. He doesn't come back out and there isn't an exodus of screaming patrons from the Starbucks, so he must have settled into a quiet corner.

We decide to risk it - the need for caffeination being larger than our queasiness over craziness.

We go in and there's not a sign of him. I roll my eyes and imagine that he's one of the homeless types that camp out in Starbucks bathrooms. We get drinks and leave and then I see him.

He's wedged himself into a nook and is reading the paper. The huge lump under the shirt WAS A FREAKING PILLOW.

This dude has pulled up a low coffee table, settled the pillow on it, taken off his shoes (but left on the socks), stretched out the legs, feet up and is browsing the Wall Street Journal
like the lord of the manor. I expected him to pull a bell and ring for Jeeves.

I'm only surprised there wasn't a silk lounging robe and some cigars in there.

I can't imagine the scene when the baristas finally realized what was going on and decided to shoo him out.

How to get free drinks at Starbucks

2010-02-26T12:30:00.002-05:00

There is a dedicated class of people who live, breathe, walk, talk and exist with one purpose in life - they never plan to pay full price for anything. Better yet if they can skim a bit off the top and get something for free: THE SCAMMERS.

I had the dubious pleasure of witnessing a true master of the craft at work last week at the Starbucks near my office.

PLEASE NOTE THAT I DO NOT SUPPORT OR ENDORSE THESE DECEPTIVE BUSINESS PRACTICES IN ANY WAY, SHAPE OR FORM. THE DEPICTION OF SAID PRACTICES HEREIN IS MERELY FOR ENLIGHTENMENT AND POTENTIAL AMUSEMENT OF THE READERS OF "STARBUCKS DRAMA" AND IS NOT INTENDED TO BE A TRAINING MANUAL FOR POTENTIAL STARBUCKS SCAMMERS. THANK YOU -- SBUXDRAMA.COM MANAGEMENT

It was lunchtime and the line was backed up like a toilet at a fat camp. There was one harried barista (Old Lady Barista) at the register and another one slinging espresso shots around at the barr as fast as that wheezing machine could make them.

The line was out the door. Out. The. Door.

As I remember from my House of Wal days, if you want to run game (pull a scam) do it when the place is slamming busy and don't try for a big haul. The place will *almost always* suffer any amount of minimal loss to get you out of the way and deal with the more pressing problem of the customers at hand.

I have to have coffee. Need it, want it, desire it, I am going to break down and die if I do not get some chocolate and caffeine into my system at this very moment.

I order and fork over my Starbucks Gold card and my personal Venti tumbler. They're churning through orders; I wedge myself in the queue at the handoff bar and start tweeting the #sbuxdrama.

Suddenly, there's trouble. My coffee hot-spot radar is so finely tuned for any and all incidents at Starbucks that I think I could probably hear a coffee bean hitting a cafe floor at a hundred paces.

The girl ahead of me - who I *clearly* heard order two skinny cinnamon dolce lattes (I know they're 90 calories, but they taste like dishwater) is protesting "WHERE'S THE REST OF MY ORDER."

Listen up kids - and if you ever catch a busy Starbucks on the right day - and don't plan to go back any time soon - this is how you score some free drinks. Note that this will *NOT* work for regulars.

I forget what she was wearing. She wasn't the office type - and I think it was another pair of those black tights that everyone and their sister is wearing nowadays. There might have been a black and red plaid skirt. Big clunky boots and a fake label purse. You can always tell the knockoffs.

She gets the two skinny cinnamon dolce lattes. Instead of leaving with those, she grabs a takeout tray and jams those drinks into it. She camps out at the bar and stares expectantly at the barista, who has already moved on to my drink.

He looks up at her and goes "Do you need something?"

She goes "Where's my other drinks?" - "What other drinks," the barista asks?" "The two caramel macchiatos."

The barista looks down at the bar, where the other one on the register has cups lined up and there's not two caramel macchiatos there. And there ain't gonna be - because she never ordered them.

First, he asks if she meant to order caramel macchiatos instead of the cinnamon dolce lattes - but she insists she ordered *four* drinks.

The barista on register is trying to deal with a beeping coffee pot, getting pastry and a line of about twelve people. The one on bar just shakes his head and whips out two caramel macchiatos and throws them across to her.

She flounces out - having enriched herself by about eight bucks at Starbucks expense.

Starbucks Drama: Mz. Monochrome cuts in line

2010-02-24T14:45:00.002-05:00

Coffee exists as the water of life for some people. Their pursuit of the inky black nectar of the Coffea arabica forestalls all other considerations - including simple human kindness.

Picture it, Sicily, 1943: [Wait, that's not right]

I went out for lunch with friends Wednesday and we strolled over to the Starbucks for a coffee before diving back in to an afternoon of work. I held the door open for one of my co-workers and a twenty-something dives through.

She's dressed in mod "artist" fashion. There's a pair of black tights and a limp gray skirt. What is either a black sweater or a warm-up jacket is tied around the size 2 waist. Further up the tree, there's a black and white striped tank top and numerous crystals dangling into the flat bosom. A purse large enough to hold Portugal flaps at her side. The purse is gray. Clearly, she has a thing for monochrome.

And for rudeness.

I'm holding the door open for a co-worker and she plunges right in. She then executes an elbow sharp enough to knife through an NFL defensive line and slices her way to the register. My friend turns to me and says - loud enough for everyone, including Mz. Monochrome, to hear - "Did she just cut in front of me?"

Mz. Monochrome, who has already ordered a double tall skinny cinnamon dolce latte and has the Bank of America card flipped out to pay for it, turns, wrinkles her pert nose and goes "Well, I'm in a hurry. I can't wait for you."

And with that, she turns around and flounces of to the handoff bar, where she studiously ignores us until she gets her drink.

There's not really much to do with these types - unless you can hold them down and force-feed them whipped cream until they explode.

UPDATED WITH LOCATION: Starbucks Drama: Is this the latest model Starbucks customer?

2010-02-22T16:53:00.002-05:00

I don't know anything else about this except that one of my social media friends either found it or spotted it *somewhere* and forwarded it to me Monday afternoon. Bless him, he even used the #sbuxdrama hashtag!

WE HAVE A LOCATION! This is located at the Starbucks in Cape Coral, Florida. The address is 2378 Surfside Boulevard, Cape Coral, 33991; store phone: (239) 283-1357.

@bubbasroadhouse: http://twitpic.com/14s760 - @napleschris made out of starbucks cups and bags #sbuxdrama

This of course started both the Southwest Florida and the Starbucks twitter-spheres buzzing.

@napleschris: Just. Wow. RT @Bubbasroadhouse: http://twitpic.com/14s760 A person made out of #Starbucks cups & bags #sbuxdrama

@GAstarbucksgirl: @napleschris LOL that is hilarious!

@tjthunder: http://twitpic.com/14s760 - @napleschris made out of starbucks cups and bags #sbuxdrama (via @Bubbasroadhouse)

I would love to have this perched in the corner of my apartment. More than 50 miles away. I think I might have to road trip and get my photo taken with the masterpiece and see if I can acquire it!

Starbucks Drama: Personal Space Invaders

2010-02-21T13:16:00.001-05:00

So. I'm trying to get a Starbucks and flirt with the Saggy Pants Barista (that's a tale for another time) who always tries to up-sell me on whatever product Starbucks happens to be pushing at the moment. Last week it was the organic almonds. This week it was raisins. Nice, but pricey. Gift with purchase maybe?

Anyway. I order my usual - iced venti no-whip mocha - and back away from the register. Or at least I *try* to back away from the register. Unbeknownst to me, a suburban housefrau had stepped up right behind me and was intent on securing space in line for herself and an entirely unprepossessing daughter. Ugh.

I nearly collide with her and she gives me a dirty look. I wrinkle my nose and give her a nasty look right back and force her to come to terms with the fact that she invaded my personal space. I'm not usually rude, but I really do not like people to be all up in my personal space. She natters "Oh, I'm so sorry. I just wasn't paying any attention to how close I was. I just didn't want them to skip over me." Skip over you? Lady. There ain't NOBODY ELSE IN LINE!

I browse the wall of merchandise (you never know, there *might* be a good deal on that over-priced stuff) and observe how dirty the condiment station is. Splenda users, would it kill you to take a napkin and sweep the spilled fake sugar crystals and empty paper packets into the gaping maw of the bin instead of just leaving it there for some green apron wage slave to clean up?

I vaguely hear ice cubes being shaken and a barista calling out my drink and the teenage slattern - clad in pink and black striped tights - going "MOM, that is HIS drink." I look over and the housefrau has her gnarled and twisted extremities around my iced mocha in a death grip that Lord Vader would be proud of. The barista is trying to pry her fingers off it and is nodding in agreement - "yes, that's HIS drink" and pointing at me."

This woman has the temerity to say "Oh, well, I didn't know. I forgot what I ordered already."

What planet do these people *LIVE ON?*

Starbucks drops words "coffee company" from receipts

2010-02-19T16:18:00.000-05:00

I have been trying for weeks to first FIND and them REMEMBER to scan and post side-by-side examples of the new receipts I've been getting at Starbucks.

I thought I had trashed all of my old-style receipts but I found one when I was cleaning out my laptop bag.

You can download the PDF copy and get detailed notes. But here are the high points.

1. The word COFFEE has disappeared from the receipt entirely. So has the branding "STARBUCKS COFFEE COMPANY." Is this really the message that Starbucks wants to be sending - that they're not a coffee company?

2. Your barista's name is now right on the receipt - at least the one who rings you up. So, if someone is cranky at the register - you know who call and complain about. I bet there are howls about this at stores. Customers are *notoriously* forgetful "?? um, the blonde one ??" - but now they have a name.

3. Why does it say CHECK CLOSED? Was it ever open? Am I going to run a tab at a Starbucks?

4. There is better information about each store, including addresses and telephone numbers. The old receipts had the store number - which customers didn't care about - and the internal lingo. Customers couldn't tell how to find it from those - nor how to call it.

The old receipt is at left below - and the new one at right. Baristas, customers - anyone have experience with these? After scanning, I dug around in my desk and found another old-style receipt from January 16 - so the change-over happened some time within the past month.

Starbucks Receipt Changes

Starbucks Drama: Two ice cubes for one cappuccino idiot

2010-02-15T09:56:00.003-05:00

I have said it before and I will say it again. Entitled yuppies are the bane of a retail workers existence.

I sat not five feet from one of the nastiest, most hateful encounters I've seen inside a Starbucks in a long, long time and I really feel compelled to give an enormous (albeit anonymous) hand to this barista. She held it together well - and I am so glad I always tip her - because she took a load of crap with a side of crap, crap dressing, crap salad and crap flambé for dessert.

The order was two tall cappuccinos (a his and hers yuppie golden years special). She's one of the fastest workers around. The store is slow and there's no milk ready. She steamed some fresh milk for them while the shots brew. Unfortunately, steaming the milk - which I would have wanted instead of milk that had been stewing all day - may have been a mistake.

She makes the cappuccinos - in order, espresso, steamed milk and milk foam.

She hands off the drinks and the Golden Guru has an issue - apparently because he heard a milk steamer going.

"I WANT SOME ICE," he barks, before he ever even touches the drink. There is no please or thank you and the tone of command is implicit in his voice. The barista exists to serve him. Her low creature can't fathom the needs of a man of his skill, his grace, his virility - "I NEED SOME ICE."

This must happen a lot, because she scoops up a few cups with a cup and asks if he'd like to keep the cup. "I WANT THEM IN THE COFFEE." At this point, there is a bit of an eye roll she gets the the ice.

He opens the cup and she tips the scoop with the ice cubes. "NOT TOO MANY! I DON'T WANT ALL THAT ICE! WHY DID YOU PUT ALL THAT ICE IN THERE? I SAID I DIDN'T WANT ALL THAT ICE!"

There is definitely a sigh. "I WANT ANOTHER DRINK. I CAN'T DRINK THIS ONE NOW."

Everything gets real quiet. Even the sound system drops a level, as if the tension is going to ramp up a level. Grandpa Golden Years is standing at the handoff bar, glaring. The barista cranks it up into high gear and starts slamming things.

I hear spoons, pots, silverware and anything else behind the bar that can be banged, slammed or crashed to make noise doing just that in an aggressive passive-aggressive display of displeasure.

However, instead of just making the drink a few degrees cooler - WHICH WILL ACCOMPLISH THE SAME EFFECT - the old man gets antsy and starts stage-managing the drink.

"I WANT YOU TO MAKE IT AND THEN PUT TWO ICE CUBES INTO IT. I WANT EXTRA FOAM TOO. JUST LIKE THAT."

There are daggers coming out of the barista's eyes - and she is trying with extreme prejudice to look everywhere except at the man. If looks could kill, everyone within a five-block radius would surely have been reduced to slag hours ago.

Things continue to slam. She more or less throws the drink across the bar, although she does it "professionally." What is her reward?

A NASTY LOOK AND A STOMP ACROSS THE FLOOR. Where they spend the next 45 minutes sipping two tall cappuccinos and staring down the barista as if she committed some awful crime.

UPDATED: Starbucks drops signature hot chocolate, espresso truffle - both gone by end of February

2010-02-12T18:08:00.005-05:00

****Updates are rolling in on the demise of Signature Hot Chocolate at Starbucks. Let's break it down in by the numbers.

1. Starbucks is dropping SIGNATURE HOT CHOCOLATE and ESPRESSO CHOCOLATE TRUFFLE. The regular hot chocolate, which is made with steamed milk and mocha base, will REMAIN. Starbucks will *still* have a "warm chocolate milk" option on the menu for the coffee-wary.

2. Baristas confirm that stores WILL NOT be able to order Signature Hot Chocolate after February 28. Individual stores will continue to have the ability to serve the drink until their supplies run out. When it is gone, it is gone. If you're married to the drink, I suggest bribing a store manager for a case.

3. Baristas at the store I visited tonight and on StarbucksGossip.com confirm that the drink was never a big seller. The official reason for the discontinuation is "low customer demand."

4. Additionally, multiple baristas (in person and on StarbucksGossip.com) mention some sort of "change" in the product months after it launched. Most say it went from a sweeter, chocolatey flavor toward a darker, more bitter taste.

5. The drink's excessive caloric count (a venti with whip cream clocks in at an astounding 600 calories) was probably another mark against it. The drink *comes* with non-fat milk, by the way. By comparison, a venti Java Chip Frappuccino has the same 600 calories, and a venti White Chocolate Mocha Frappuccino clocks below that at 550.

*MORE* breaking Starbucks news.

Where they succeed with coffee, they fail with chocolate. The second chocolate drink in five years is apparently gone after just 16 months on the market.

Starbucks is removing the Signature Hot Chocolate from menus - and with it the Espresso Chocolate Truffle, which uses the signature hot chocolate as a base. As far as I know, the much-easier-to-make classic hot chocolate, produced with just mocha base and steamed milk, will remain.

The Signature Hot Chocolate was introduced in September 2008. As of yet, I cannot find anything official on the Web about the end of the Signature Hot Chocolate offering. Baristas in some stores privately confirm that the news of Signature Hot Chocolate's exit from store menus was in the Starbucks portal. A poster at StarbucksGossip.com confirmed that an action notice was sent to stores Monday, February 8, 2010 and that Signature Hot Chocolate will be gone by the end of February.

I, for one, desperately miss the Chantico, although apparently no one else does. Chantico lasted just 13 months - from January 2005 to Febuary 2006 - and its demise was covered in USA Today.

I really feel like I do not know the company any more. I *love* the coffee and the convenience. But I feel like Starbucks is trying to be an aspirational "food/health/product" company instead of a coffee company. The reach for the Oprah/Ellen/Dr. Phil market is turning off people who value the "third-space" vibe. If there were decent alternatives around, I would honestly start exploring them.

There are exactly two indie coffee houses in this town. One of closes at 6 p.m., the other (far inferior, no WiFi, no food) at 9 p.m. There are at least a dozen Starbucks, two of which are open until 11 p.m. and another until midnight - perfect for a night owl like me. They have WiFi, which is free for me - for now, with their complicated program.

Starbucks and Chase cancel Duetto Credit card

2010-02-11T23:57:00.009-05:00

This is confirmed. I got the letter when I got home today.

This is the opening paragraph of the letter I received from Chase: "As a loyal Starbucks Card Duetto Visa cardmember, we want to let you know about some important program changes which will affect your account. WHAT'S CHANGING? The credit card partnership between Starbucks and Chase Bank, USA, N.A. has ended. As a result, in April 2010 your Starbucks Duetto credit card account will be replaced with the new Chase Freedom credit card. We know you have come to expect great rewards with Chase and we think you'll enjoy the great features and benefits that come with Chase Freedom."

There is a two-page letter that explains the "decision" and lays out the benefits of the Chase Blueprint program. There is also a flyer, about one-third of a page, with a coffee cup, with the headline "NEW Avoid the interest on everyday spending with Full Pay." It has features of the Chase Blueprint program and a link to the chase.com/blueprint.

I am saddened and disappointed at this decision by Starbucks, but not surprised. I was a heavy, heavy user of the Duetto card for one reason - and one reason only. If you set up an automatic reload from the Duetto *credit* card to your Starbucks card, you got a 3% Duetto dollars reward each month. If you reloaded your Starbucks card any other way and on credit card purchases, you only got 1% Duetto dollars.

With the recent changes to the Starbucks card, it is *clear* that Starbucks considers that it has already "captured" its loyal customers who passionate, committed brand advocates and will continue to come to the stores no matter what rewards are offered.

New marketing initiatives - the Perfect Oatmeal coupon for one, the undrinkable "skinny" drinks for another - are aimed at expanding the customer base beyond the already converted sheep who flock to the High Church of Espresso morning, noon and night and into the fields of wavering faithful who have not yet drunk deeply from the cup of the gospel of Howard Schulz.

I will be canceling the card in April 2010. My Starbucks Gold card with the 10% discount is valid until August 2010 because I didn't register it until August 2009. I predict my Starbucks consumption will drop dramatically in September 2010.

The Consumerist looks like it might have gotten the news first. Laura Northrup has a post.

Starbucks And Chase End Duetto Rewards Credit Card
The Starbucks Duetto Visa card seems like a relic of another time. A time when everyone thought that both coffee-infused sugar bombs and huge amounts of credit card debt were a good idea. Well, Starbucks is still with us, but the Duetto Visa card's run is over. read the complete post at The Consumerist

The Seatle Times Coffee City blog, written by Melissa Allison, also has something, posted at 6:03 p.m. read her post

Starbucks discontinues Duetto Visa card, another blow for some loyalists
At the same time Starbucks is getting rid of its gold card, which cost $25 a year and was used by Starbucks' most loyal customers to get 10 percent discounts, the company is discontinuing its Duetto Visa card too. The Visa program began in 2003 with Bank One -- now part of JPMorgan Chase (like WaMu is). read the complete post at Melissa Allison's Coffee City blog for the Seattle times

Starbucks Drama: I bet Jersey Shore never has "situations" like this

2010-02-11T14:53:00.003-05:00

Seven tweets worth of Starbucks Drama! Broken sewer pipe? Someone for whom the "Perfect Oatmeal" wasn't so perfect? Passive-aggressive way of protesting the new Gold card status? The world will never know.

Please don't punish your baristas by creating bathroom "Situations." "Situations" should be left on the Jersey Shore, oiled, tanned and greased to within an inch of their lives and stuck in front of a camera with a hobbit named Snooki. Not left in a Starbucks bathroom.

THE PLAYERS:
@lchronister
@joeldermole
@ryanmgreene
@napleschris

THE SETTING:
An unknown Starbucks, in a galaxy far, far away.

>> Fecal disaster at Starbucks today. No idea what happened. No desire to know.

>> @lchronister Yours or somebody else's?
>> @lchronister Wait, YOU had a fecal disaster? Or one ensued before you arrived? Please, PLEASE, elaborate.

>> We must know! RT @lchronister: Fecal disaster at Starbucks today. No idea what happened. No desire to know. #sbuxdrama

>> @joeldermole Either someone else's or maybe a sewer backup or something. I walked in and nearly walked right back out.

>> @ryanmgreene No, not me. That's why I don't know anything. I just walked in and it was like the T&M after rodeo week, minus the hay.

>> @napleschris I wanted to ask, but the barista seemed so off-put (probably from having to deal with the smell) that I didn't have the heart.

Please remember that if have exceptionally snarky, funny, cranky or downright scandalous news from Starbucks that you're sending out in to the Twittersphere, use the #sbuxdrama hashtag! Peace, Love and Cheetos!

Starbucks Drama: Empty chairs at broken tables

2010-02-10T18:30:00.002-05:00

This vision of health, safety and politeness greeted me as I tried to find a place to blog Tuesday night.

PHOTO GALLERY: Leg is broken; Please do not use. Thank you

At least it wasn't pasted to the table with Starbucks Via stickers.
Like that unfortunate bathroom sign ....

Starbucks Drama: What are you doing with those rubber gloves?

2010-02-09T22:40:00.001-05:00

I didn't even have to place an order before the drama started tonight.

I'm standing at the register and not a single one of the three baristas on duty after 10 p.m. at this Starbucks is paying the slightest bit of attention to me. Not in the slightest.

Their attention is riveted on something happening in, around and under the espresso machine.

One of the baristas, a new girl, slightly built, willowy, with a great deal of curly brown hair and resembling nothing so much as a skein of yarn that's been unraveled and jammed atop a broomstick, is standing there, ramrod straight, in her green Starbucks apron and an absolutely horrified look on her faee. She's wearing yellow rubber gloves, the kind that workers use to clean out the toilet. They reach up past her elbows. She probably wants to cry. Slinging coffee wasn't supposed to be like THIS!

The male of the group, a Caucasian with enough fake bling in his ears to open a "Ice is Nyce" franchise, stands crouched over something part of the way between the handoff bar and the espresso machine. The lower half of his body and one arm is under the counter - the upper half and the other arm is leveraged over it. He grunts, yanks, grunts and yanks. I have no doubt that a hernia is forthcoming.

The wise blonde, who flicks her eyes up at me by way of greeting before going back to a long, complicated six-drink drive-through order, says a perfunctory hello. I stare. I'm tired and there are a bunch of other laptop campers out in the lobby. This is as good as the drama is going to get tonight. I move in for the kill.

Yellow Gloves just stands there, helpless. She's probably a trust fund baby, just working to make booze money while Daddy makes the payments on the Mercedes, the apartment and the tuition. She's hoping for a wealthy man to come in, order a latte and sweep her off her feet.

Bling-Bling is still under the counter, grunting. I ask Blondie, "So what's going on?"

She keeps whipping out lattes for the drive-through, but answers, "Oh, we're just cleaning. But this one thing, it gets stuck, so we have to break it loose." She continues "Don't mind the smell. We know it stinks in here. We'll have it clean in a few minutes." Yet, she's making mochas over an what looks like an open garbage disposal!

Bling-Bling lies down on the floor now, moves almost all the way under the counter, and starts thrusting violently. I can see the counter shaking. Whatever this .... whatever .... is .... which I still don't know ... it must have been attached with a combination of SuperGlue and rivets the likes of which Superman put in.

Yellow Gloves is still quietly squeaking, and going, "Don't break it." Blondie is calmly steadying bottles of caramel syrup, my iced mocha and and few random shot glasses. She is completely unfazed. "We always have trouble with this. That's why we have have a man do it." And the ERA was just put back another decade.

I hear a massive "UUUNGHHH!"- soon followed by "It's loose." Bling-Bling emerges from underneath the counter wearing a massive grin and is surprisingly not dirty in the least.

Yellow Gloves moves in, crouches down and removes something that looks roughly like an upside-down bell, only there is an obvious pipe in the handle end where it was attached to either water or possibly drainage. She's got one finger firmly plugged up in this and heads straight for the sink.

Blondie remarks "Well. That's over, and we didn't even have to call the fire department this time." Bling-Bling goes "That's why I'm here!"

Baristas ... was this the garbage disposal?

Sweet tooth night at the biker bar

2010-02-08T20:40:00.001-05:00

Someone should really do some sort of Starbucks correlation between the type of drinks people buy and the disconnect that sometimes happens between the appearance and the reality of the coffee buyer and the drink.

To wit, the wonderful world of Alice down the Rabbit Hole that I witnessed tonight.

Please note that I really don't care what the hail someone orders. I really don't care who, what, where, you are, exist, be or on what plane of existence you chose to play house - as long as you're not causing me grief.

However, I love delicious irony and subtle snark with all the fierceness with which I mow through a field of the Starbucks chocolate sparkle donuts. And I will chomp down a few acres of those faster than a witch will call out some flying monkeys!

I'm sitting in the corner, minding my own business and snarking on some old Eurotrash wearing striped sweaters (black and white for him, ugly red, blue, green and purple with orange accents for her) and trying to figure out how to work my iPhone.

Something gargoylish, clad all in black stomps up. I would say that it defies description - but nothing defies my powers of purple prose.

Male, six-foot plus, with hair that has only a passing familiarity with shampoo but a well-worn acquaintance with both grease and a pompadour. The bushy poof rides high on his head like a wet racoon poised to strike at a fish in a pond. That's the high point, literally and figuratively.

A thin goatee frames the pudgy face, a vain attempt to disguise a weak and almost non-existent chin, which itself is swallowed up into a thick neck, which itself disappears into an atrocity of all atrocities, a green camouflage T-shirt worn over a black turtleneck. Green camoflage - worn in a totally unironic fashion.

This stunning and fashionable ensemble is tucked into a pair of black stone-washed denim jeans, which are THEN tucked into leather biker boots. A wallet hangs on the obligatory pocket chain.

The only thing that is missing is a spiked dog collar and some miscellaneous leather jewelry.

And what, pray tell, does this paragon of toughness order?

A tall strawberries and creme frappuccino and a slice of lemon pound cake.

Obviously, it was sweet tooth night at the biker bar.

Starbucks Drama: Call 1-900-Frappucino Meltdown

2010-02-05T11:00:00.004-05:00

The late-nights at Starbucks are always a recipe for high drama. Late nights at fast food places are always a recipe for drama in general, because the staff wants to be able to close up the second the clock hits whatever magic hour is closing time, while the customers expect a full menu available at whatever time they walk in the door.

Starbucks is no different. The delivery truck apparently didn't run Saturday morning - so there were few pastries, no sandwiches, no signature hot chocolate mix for the espresso truffle and worst of all - NO FRAPPUCCINO BASE.

They ran out at approximately 10:45 p.m. - I know, because I was sitting there typing and the shift supervisor was on the phone with someone confirming that the truck was due first thing in the morning.

The action was pretty dead by then - most of the downtown action in this city rolls up by 11 p.m. anyway - so it wasn't like denying people their frappuccinos for 75 minutes was going to kill anyone. Except, apparently, it was.

The downtown Starbucks closes at midnight on Fridays and Saturdays. At 11:42 p.m., a wide-eyed and frantic twentysomething flew in wearing pajama pants and a dirty T-shirt that had seen better days during the Clinton presidency. She had a faux Louis Vuitton pocketbook and one of those keychains that was nothing but a bunch of memento keyrings chained together and looked like it weighed about three pounds.

Fake Louis tore into the Starbucks and starts gasping for breath, because at a her size, walking a few feet is a chore.

Fake Louis Vuitton: "Ohmigod. Please tell me you guys are still open."
Barista: "You're here. The door's open. The lights are on. What do you want?" The shift supervisor of this Starbucks is young, sort of ghetto and very cool.

Fake Louis Vuitton: "OHMYGODIMSOGLADIMADEIT." Breathe honey, breathe.
Barista: "What can I get for you ma'am?"

Fake Louis Vuitton: "I need two chocolate chip frappuccinos and two black and white frappuccinos." Yes, yes, yes. Someone actually ordered a black and white frappuccino.
Barista: "I'm sorry. We're out of frappuccino."

Fake Louis Vuitton: "Oh hell no." I really did not think people said this in real life. She went from pathetically grateful they were open to bitch in about two seconds.
Barista: "I'm really sorry. We didn't get a delivery today. Can we make you an iced coffee or an iced mocha? We can do just about anything else, but we don't have frappuccinos."

Fake Louis Vuitton: "Well, we want frappuccinos. Make it with something else."
Barista: "We don't have the special mix used in frappuccinos."

Fake Louis Vuitton: "Can you blend up some ice cubes and coffee?"
Barista: "That is iced coffee. It won't taste like frappuccino."

Fake Louis Vuitton: "Well why not? It is all coffee isn't it?"
Barista: "Not really. Frappuccino is a special drink."

Fake Louis Vuitton: "Well, where's a Starbucks that's open? I need a frappuccino."
Barista: "Uhhhh."

Fake Louis Vuitton: "What about the drive-through on Pine Ridge?"
ME (because I jump in): "They closed at 11 p.m."

Fake Louis Vuitton: "Well, where is a Starbucks where I can get a frappuccino?"
ME (because I know more than the barista): "There's only one 24-hour Starbucks in two counties." And I tell her where it is. It is 31 miles north, in another county.

Fake Louis Vuitton: "Are you SERIOUS?"
ME: "YEP."

Fake Louis Vuitton: Calls up her friend on the phone and starts screaming. "HOW MUCH DO YOU LOVE ME? BECAUSE I'M NOT DRIVING UP TO FORT MYERS FOR SOME DAMN F****** FRAPPUCCINOS."
Barista: "I'm really sorry ma'am."

Fake Louis Vuitton: "What the hell kind of Starbucks is this that runs out of coffee?"

Fake Louis Vuitton: (on the phone, to her friends) "I TOLD YOU THEY SAID THEY'RE OUT!"
Fake Louis Vuitton: "Well, I don't know. There is nowhere else I can go. You're just going to have to wait."

Fake Louis Vuitton: "I'm never coming back to this Starbucks."

Starbucks Drama: You don't have to have espresso to make espresso

2010-02-01T20:30:00.001-05:00

I *really* needed to do real work tonight, but the conversation between the two baristas working tonight is just a stunning illustration of the failures of the American education system.

I was only half paying attention - and trying to do real work - and thus missed most of the thread of the conversation, but these choice bon mots floated through. I was trying to do research and took these down, roughly in the order they happened.

1. "If you work hard you'll get raises."

2. "When I go out with my girlfriend, I feel bad because I can't hit on other girls and have a good time. My girlfriend, she's gone now." I wonder why?

3. "People with GEDs and holding down two jobs are lazy. They should be in college."

4. "I'm not quitting, I'm just leaving this Starbucks. And every Starbucks."

5. "You don't have to have espresso to make espresso." This was absolutely the most puzzling statement of the night. I *think* he was talking about the fact that in truth, any coffee bean can be ground into the super-fine blend used for espresso roast, although coffee purists (and Italians) prefer darker roast beans.

6. "Where's Haiti? Isn't it that island? Where that thing happened?" *there are no words*

7. "Why aren't you the shift supervisor? I'm an irresponsible, forgetful screwup." At least he was honest about why an 18-year old with a popped collar was in charge.

8. From a customer: "Currently, what I'm writing on requires a black pen. Do you have a black pen by any chance?" Those were his exact words. Currently, I'm wondering who uses "currently" in casual conversation.

9. "My favorite band isn't my favorite band anymore because the drummer got kicked out. Now, it is like he is standing on the side of the music road waiting for someone to pick him up. He's a good drummer, someone will stop and pick him up because he sells lots of records."

10. In reference to #9: "They weren't better than A-HA." Whoa. Just. Whoa.

11. Also in reference to #9: "They had a lot of old lady band-aids." Band Depends?

12. "Don't put the toasted sandwiches in the toaster. Put them in the microwave. They taste better." Oh. My. GOD. WHY DON'T THEY TELL THE CUSTOMERS THIS!

Starbucks Drama: How to make the perfect espresso

2010-01-31T19:21:00.003-05:00

NOTE: If I did not make this clear, this is not me making the espresso! The video was shot at Intelligentsia Coffee and Tea in Venice, California. I'm on the other coast.

I ran across this today. How to make the perfect espresso. Part two is also available. This is fascinating - and it really demonstrates the difference between "espresso," which is what I drink, and "coffee," which is the nasty brewed crap that comes out of an urn.

Espresso, Intelligentsia from Department of the 4th Dimension on Vimeo.

It’s the first part of an ongoing series of videos from The Department of the 4th Dimension

Starbucks Drama: Skinny Drinks for Skinny Boys with Skinny Brains

2010-01-30T23:16:00.002-05:00

The contradictions and mental issues of Starbucks customers will forever baffle me. For starters, there are the types that order black coffee but then grab a 500 calorie muffin and load the coffee with milk, cream, sugar and chocolate powder. Others are far, far worse. To wit.

This one rolled in Saturday night, one of the urban hipsters who flock to Starbucks like moths to a flame, frat boys to a sorority kegger or snowbirds to a 4 p.m. "Early Bird" special at Red Lobster.

A skeletal white boy, wearing skinny jeans, with that stone-wash denim look and baby blue American Eagle T-shirt comes to the counter and orders a tall skinny cinnamon dolce latte. These only have 90 calories (grande goes to 130, venti to 160), and are "allegedly" complete with all the flavor of the regular, full-calorie cinnamon dolce lattes, but sans all the calories.

The skinny cinnamon dolce latte comes with sugar-free Cinnamon Dolce syrup and non-fat milk. By contrast, a regular tall cinnamon dolce latte has 290 calories, 14 grams of fat and 30 grams of sugar. Having had one, I can also attest to the fact that they taste like dishwater - rancid dishwater that has been sitting in the sink for three weeks. If you're going down to the the skinny drinks after drinking the good stuff, it tastes like weak smack.

Anyway. Our pretty boy, in the distressed skinny jeans and distressed baby blue American Eagle tee that looks like it may have been cropped to show off a sliver of his toned stomach, wants a skinny cinnamon dolce latte. It doesn't come with whipped cream, although he confirms this with the barista. He looks like like the type to get manorexia.

Pretty Boy Blue, who I noticed is wearing mandals, hovers over the barista as she makes it. He asks her "Can you make that with soy milk?" Maybe he's a milk freak? I dunno.

He gets the drink and goes over to the condiment bar. Where he proceeds to take off the lid and sprinkle the drink with heretofore "skinny" drink with chocolate powder.

He tastes it, grimaces and then goes to sit outside to talk with other bright young things. Not for long though. He's back inside after two sips.

Pretty Boy Blue comes to the handoff bar and asks the barista making drinks "Can you put whip cream on this?"

She gives him one of "those" looks, like "THAT IS A SKINNY DRINK. WHIPPED CREAM DEFEATS THE PURPOSE!"

Nevertheless, she snatches the cup off the bar with a fierce, almost angry motion, reaches out a taloned claw for the silver aerosal can of whipped cream, gives it an angry shake and unfurls a mountain of whipped cream of prodigious proportions onto the drink.

Pretty Boy Blue's eyes goggle at the mound of sugary goodness now floating serenely atop his previously low-calorie drink. The enormous load of whipped cream on there probably doubled, if not tripled the calorie load.

For a prissy calorie-counter like this Pretty Boy Blue, who eats protein in lieu of carbohydrates, eschews beer for martinis and probably shaves his chest, this was a problem. Of his on making, no less.

He opened his mouth to complain - gets a dirty look from the barista, who is still holding the can of whipped cream and just might clock him across the head with it. Plus, I'd put money on her in a fight. He might break a nail or muss up his hair or something. She'd just claw his eyes out.

Pretty Boy Blue promptly shuts his mouth, grabs a stirrer and makes a production of breaking up the mountain of whipped cream and melting and stirring it into his drink. He does all of this at the handoff bar instead of back at his table.

The taloned barista is unmoved by this display of potion-making talent. She must have a bit of the Severus Snape in her.

Thirty seconds later, the whipped cream has been disseminated into the hot and no longer skinny cinnamon dolce latte. Pretty Boy Blue snaps the lid back on the drink and heads out the door to rejoin the bright young things with which he's conversing, to talk of life, of love, of mandals and face creams and undoubtedly of cranky Starbucks baristas.

Starbucks Drama: These kids are howling mad

2010-01-22T23:53:00.004-05:00

Princesses. And not the Disney kind. These are what I call the bored packs of chronological adults but psychological feotuses who roam downtowns on Saturday nights looking for a solution to their own stupidity that doesn't involve gnawing off their own limbs out of boredom.

A pack of principessas walks in. The melting pot is in full effect, with hues in all colors of the rainbow. The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. would be so proud. I say that with zero snark. If Crayola tried to make "flesh" color based on one of this lot, they'd have to pick a hue ranging from dark chocolate to ivory.

He would quail in shame at their utter lack of respect for anything and anyone else in the coffee shop. Who would imagine that this deck of dunces - all under five-and-a-half-feet tall could make enough racket to drive everyone within a two-block radius running for the next Virgin Galactic flight to Alpha Centauri?

Specimen One - who could probably play linebacker for a Division II football team - parks her denim-clad hips and the rest of herself in front of the pastry case and starts to peruse. And apparently this is a royal pastry progress, with the cupcakes carrying pennons and the cookies being drawn on a coach and four - for she intends to stay awhile. Hurricanes will topple trees in Canada before she moves. She puts a finger in the air, cocks her head to the side, rolls the neck, flips the lips and squawks with all the grace of a garbage disposal eating a plastic spoon "Ya'll, whadda I want up in hurrrr? Whadda they be havin?" The language of Shakespeare is such a thing of beauty, of poetry, of precision and wit. It has been broken beyond the borders of all known repair.

Specimen Two - skinny jeans and turquoise ballet flats (what IS IT with those things?) gets her black coffee (diet, natch) and goes to the condiment bar. Where she proceeds to doctor it to the point it no longer resembles coffee. While hollering to her friends - "I CAYNT BELIEVE HE SAID THAT!" "NO HE DIDN'T" "I KNOW THAT AIN'T RIGHT" "I'MA SMACK HER ACROST DE FACE WHEN I GET UP IN THAT HOUSE." Again. Language. Are they learning to speak it at all? I want to SEE their text messages. It must be written in what would be the equivalent of Minoan to you or me.

Specimens Three, Four and Five - with five being a male who joined late - conquered the comfy chairs in the corner and dragged more chairs over to join them. Three triple chocolate chocolate chip frappuccinos for them, with whipped cream and they specifically asked for extra chocolate syrup. They're young. They won't get diabetes for another two years.

Specimen Three has on skinny jeans, a Banana Republic Oxford and lime green canvas shoes. They're cute, but lime? Really? Her feet look like they're searching for a Jimmy Buffet song and honey you are not old enough to drink.

Specimen Four has on dark, dark, dark blue denim high-water jeans. I don't think she shaved her legs for this. And something pink. It is very bizarre. I never thought that pink and whatever color of dark-wash denim this is really went together. It sort of looks like a half-melted Starlight mint that's stuck on the upholstery of somebody's grandpa's Oldsmobile 88.

Her hair is also crying out for a hot oil treatment. CRYING. Girls. Ya'll *need* to take good care of your hair. No man will love you if you do the Britney Spears bald look. The Sinead O'Connor Bald might be OK. She is shod in something black and clunky that looks like hooves. I had a pair of mules similar to that in college. I wore them to a club one night and lost one of them on the dance floor. That was fun.

Specimen Five, the male, is wearing brown slip-on house shoes, the kind old men wear when they can't tie laces. They don't even have a back. I swear to all the dark powers of Kali, Cthulhu and Baal, these are not fashion sandals - THEY ARE HOUSE SHOES. I can see the fabric.

He also just howled.

Let me repeat that. This child just howled, like Benicio del Toro in "Wolfman," HOWLED. I also question whether he is interested in those girls as "friends" or "girlfriends," because I saw a suspiciously limp wrist, but that's a discussion for another time.

Specimen Five's boyfriend (or "bro") just showed up. They seem to share cell phones like adults share child-care responsibilities. Five is making assurances to someone on the phone "YEAH, YEAH, I'LL BE THERE TOMORROW. I GET OUT AT THREE. I PROMISE I'LL BE THERE. I SAID I'LL BE THERE. DAMN. DO YOU WANT TO CALL ME OR DON'T YOU TRUST ME?" I don't think they trust you. What do ya'll think?

He has spread his legs in the chair, is flapping his arms and talking to the ladies. About marriage, as it seems. The plot thins.

This was specimen number five's description of his future marriage ceremony. You make the call. "I'm going to get married on an island. The waves are going to beat against the rocks. The clouds are going to part, the birds are going to cry and you're going to see a rainbow, nothing but color." Gentlemen, ladies, at least he's got a romantic side - whichever side it is buttered on!

Starbucks Drama: Tangerine culottes and a baleful glare

2010-01-20T21:34:00.001-05:00

Now, we all know that I like my comfy chair. The way this Starbucks is currently configured, I can sit in the corner and view the entire store, the register and the handoff bar. And be in the comfy chair. If it is crowded, I sit wherever. But I prefer the comfy chair. Tangerine Culottes had other ideas.

I'm browsing/typing away when she walks in and nails - nay, flays - me with a look. This old bird could probably sandblast the hulls of oil tankers with her tongue and give Kal-El a run for his money in the heat vision department. I don't really have a problem with staring, so I hit her back. Because she is wearing tangerine culottes.

This isn't a skirt. It isn't pants. It doesn't hit the ankle. It isn't shorts. It lands somewhere between knee and ankle and has a balloon effect. And it is bright tangerine. BRIGHT. Day-Glo even.

Her shoes are even more interesting, because they are THE SAME shade and resemble what I can only describe as tangerine bondage gear. There's a wide sole with a web of straps in that same bright orange coming out of a central strip. It looks like an orange spider is nestling on each of her feet.

The top is ... interesting. Her shirt looks like a roll of Life-Savers, lots of rings of different colors, with a bulge in the middle just over her waist. Was that uncharitable? Don't care. Over this is YET MORE tangerine, a GAP or Old Navy sweater. This woman *lives* for tangerine. I would seriously hate to see her bathroom. Probably looks like a Minute Maid factory blew up.

I really do not know what I did to upset her. Probably sat in her favorite chair. Either way, I get a look that would melt lesser mortals into the purple upholstery. It bounces. I tweet. She moves on.

She and her friend, who's wearing some dumpy denim and a ratty color-block shirt that Martha Stewart's gardener's gardener's housekeeper doesn't do the dishes in sit down and proceed to slice their way through four slices of pound cake (two apiece) and two caramel macchiatos while carrying on in a high whine about grandkids, traveling to Greece and some Italian restaurant Tangerine Culottes and her friend Susan visited last week. Poor Susan.

Dumpy Denim just screeched "THAT WAS A VISUAL WASN'T IT?" in response to something. It sure as hell was Denim. It sure as hell was.

Starbucks Drama: That door ain't gonna open

2010-01-19T22:40:00.002-05:00

The bathroom at one of my regular Starbucks has been known to have "problematic" plumbing. At least three times in the past few months there's been a an amateurish "OUT OF ORDER" sign slapped on the door. Once it was even slapped up with Starbucks Via stickers (see photo at right).

The cake was taken tonight.

It was not just taken. It was thrown, nay, HURLED spitefully, with much venom and invective, to the French peasantry by a beribboned and bewigged Marie Antoinette who gleefully shouted "You shall not have cake! You shall have sparkle donuts and cupcakes and you shall weep in shame of glorious pastry." Granted, that doesn't make much sense, but it was pretty to write.

The downtown Starbucks put up yet another "OUT OF ORDER" sign on the bathroom tonight. The store was full when I came in, and I got one of the last tables facing right down the hall to the bathroom. The drama was incredible.

First one off the bat was a princess, who swanned in with slacks, three inch heels and enough floral perfume to mask a skunk. It was a veritable cloud of musk. There was a look down her pert little nose at the uncooperative door. Followed by a scrunching of the nose and a scowl. HOW DARE IT! And thus the door handle was jiggled. Because time, space and the very curvature of space-time shall bend to her will. Not this door though. It weren't gonna budge. So she jiggled the handle again - harder. And flounced out. After a quick glance at me to see if I'd seen her little performance. I looked away - and fought the urge to laugh - loudly.

She was followed in quick succession by a hipster with a laptop and a fortysomething blonde with black slacks and some sparkly shoes. Rhinestone cowgirl ... Riding out on a horse in a star-spangled rodeo ...

Number four is interesting. Geezerific. Six-foot plus, turquoise slacks and a sweater Bill Cosby wouldn't touch even if little Rudy gave it to him. He walks up, stares at the sign as if not quite comprehending it, then grabs the door and yanks violently. Entitlement syndrome. Lots of money, no taste and no manners. Then he reads the sign, sighs in disgust and stomps out with great clomping sounds. I've heard cows produce cowflops on concrete with less noise.

Number five is a trio of well-dressed thirtysomething men, who move en masse toward the restroom - to what end I don't know - unless they were planning to smoke dope or snort some blow. They refrain from jiggling the handle but do let out a big "Aww man," thereby revealing their probable frat-boy origins. Maybe they just had to go.

Number six was an old lady, who stared at the door with disgust and stomped out. She was wearing black tights and ballet flats and pushing one of those carts like old ladies in New York use to carry the shopping home with.

Number seven was a Hispanic couple, out on the town. She was wearing what I thought was a chocolate brown sequined jumpsuit with orange and red rhinestones on the front. It turned out to be separates - but was still ugly. Upon her toilet denial, she flipped the door the bird and turned on a cork-wedge heel and spun out, curls bobbing and some Latin invective hanging in the air.

And so it went, on through the night.

The cops were particularly interesting. It was a matched set, his and hers policemen, who came in. The blonde male cop - who could have easily doubled for Dolph Lundgren - stared at the door for a while and decided to jiggle the handle. He comes out into the main area of the Starbucks and asks "What's wrong with the bathroom?" Does it really matter what's wrong? You're still not getting in there!

One of the baristas goes over and unlocks what I always thought was a storage closet, but apparently has another toilet and a sink in it. Nice to know the baristas have a backup loo.

A pack of teenage girls comes in - and heads to the bathroom in a clump. The hive mind is in effect, only to be thwarted by three simple words - "OUT OF ORDER." It takes a while to process this, because they have to hold up a finger to the sign and go over the words. I wonder if they can read things not written in text-message speak? "Well." And they flounce out. One of them is wearing knee-high black-and-white striped socks with red Chuck Taylor All-Stars. It's a lot of look.

That was my night.

Starbucks Drama now available on Amazon Kindle!

2010-01-18T11:14:00.000-05:00

I am very pleased to announce that Starbucks Drama is now available on the Amazon Kindle.

If you have a Kindle - and feel so inclined - you can chip in $1.99 per month and get Starbucks Drama wherever you are!

Of course, you can continue to read it for free right here - and leave comments!

Thank you!